


With A Kiss

by ProfessionalMess



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: A little angst, Female Pronouns for Pidge | Katie Holt, First Kiss, Keith (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, Keith doesnt stan love, Klance Poetry Exchange 2018, Lance changes his mind, M/M, POV Keith (Voltron)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-04
Updated: 2018-10-04
Packaged: 2019-07-25 07:30:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,698
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16192934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ProfessionalMess/pseuds/ProfessionalMess
Summary: Keith wasn’t even really sure where the idea came from, and he was absolutely positive it was a bad one. But standing there, chest pressed against Lance’s as they both panted, feeling the sweat drip down his spine as his eyes roamed over Lance’s wild eyes and flushed cheeks, he really wanted to kiss him. And Keith’s only justification for the desire was that maybe the kiss would surprise Lance enough that he stopped fighting and Keith would be able to take him down that way.And since he failed to voice his plan out loud, there was no one to tell him no.





	With A Kiss

**Author's Note:**

> written for the 2018 Klance Poetry Exchange and @acourtofregretandfandomtrash on tumblr!! i hope you enjoy

_ The Ballad of Reading Gaol by Oscar Wilde (Stanza 7): _ __  
_ Yet each man kills the thing he loves _ __  
_ By each let this be heard, _ __  
_ Some do it with a bitter look, _ __  
_ Some with a flattering word, _ __  
_ The coward does it with a kiss, _ _  
_ __ The brave man with a sword! 

  
  
  


Keith didn’t understand love.

 

Maybe it was because he hadn’t really ever experienced it, or because it was just something he couldn’t wrap his mind around, but it made no sense to him. 

 

He knew that his father had probably loved him when he was alive, even if he never said so. And he figured he had probably loved his father back, when he could still remember what he was like. But the memories of the man who had raised him were gone, as were the fleeting emotions attached to them, and he was left as confused as ever.

 

Every foster family he’d had since then had only gone on to further prove his point that love was pointless. 

 

How could anyone truly know they were in love, anyway? The concept of love was one that had been so completely overdone, in Keith’s opinion. It was a plague of modern western culture, presented as some sort of magic cure to every problem. It was like there couldn’t be any other kind of story without it inadvertently being a love story as well, as if the world couldn’t function without obsessing over another person. 

 

Not only that, but every love story was the same. The love was either good or bad, forbidden or encouraged, helpful or hurtful. It always demanded sacrifices, caused more problems than it ever solved, turned people into someone they didn’t want to be and made them do things they didn’t want to do.

 

And yet people praised it, lusted after it as if it would somehow save them.

 

Keith didn’t  _ need  _ love. He knew who he liked and who he didn’t, knew who he wanted to spend time with and who he’d rather avoid. He didn’t have a family that he felt obligated to love, didn’t have friends that required the platonic or romantic debate, had never even considered dating anyone in his life, and he was perfectly content. He didn’t understand why everyone else couldn’t be the same way.

 

Sure, he supposed it was nice. The concept, maybe even the emotion put into practice, had a certain unavoidable appeal. How could you not want an emotion that made you blind to someone’s flaws, that bound you to a person that wasn’t always who you wanted but could fool you into thinking they were, anyway?

 

Everybody just wanted validation, didn’t they? Wasn’t that what love was for?

 

The few people Keith had asked those questions to had disagreed with him vehemently. To them, love was a promise, not a trick. It was a catalyst, not a hindrance, and it made them better, instead of bringing out their worst. 

 

And, if one was lucky, Keith supposed they were right. Love  _ could _ be those things, so he was told. But there existed the other side of the coin, and Keith couldn’t but feel like it was wholly more likely. He’d seen more people unhappy because of love than he could count, had heard more stories of betrayal than he could remember. The media didn’t stray from that kind of love, either, and was constantly churning out stories of soured love being saved by a love more sweet. 

 

Couldn’t anyone just save themselves? Why did they always need someone else to do it for them?  

 

The only person he’d ever even come close to loving was Shiro, but he didn’t truly feel anything different for him than he did anyone else. Shiro just so happened to be his favorite person, his best friend, his non-biological brother, one of the only people alive that he could tolerate. If that was love, then society was making a really big deal out of a lot of nothing. 

 

However, no matter how much Keith thought the idea of love was shoved down his throat in regular, everyday life, no one talked about it more than Lance McClain. 

 

Keith wasn’t sure Lance would even exist without love. It was as if love was his backbone, the only thing holding him up and carrying him through each day. 

 

It was fucking ridiculous. 

 

Lance flirted with everything that walked and laid on his back on the observation deck and talked about what he thought his future might be like and got this sad, kind of distant look in his eyes whenever he saw alien couples being cute with each other and it drove Keith insane.

 

If love was going to making him  _ that sad,  _ what was the point? 

 

It wasn’t until that day’s mission that Keith gained even an inkling of understanding what it was like to realize you suddenly had feelings you didn’t know what to do with. 

 

It became fairly obvious pretty early on in the fight that something about this Galra base was different. It seemed to lack many of the mindless sentries that roamed the halls normally and had instead replaced them with druids, more than Keith had ever seen in one place. Keith didn’t even know Haggar  _ had _ this many druids, let alone that they’d all be stuck on a base together.  

 

However, despite that, much of the battle was the same. Although the druids were more talented and capable than the typical sentries, the paladins had no trouble defeating them and taking them out one by one. They had almost cleared the entire force before the first real problem arose, one that affected Keith more than he would’ve liked to admit. 

 

Keith was preoccupied when it happened, so he didn’t know a lot of details. Coran would later tell him that Lance had been injected by some sort of serum that was the cause of his change in behavior, but at the moment all Keith knew was that the druid he’s just been fighting was dead on the ground and the one and only Lance McClain was whaling on him instead.

 

He turned quickly and tried to grab Lance’s wrists, but could only catch one with the bayard in his hands. That should’ve been a giant red flag, honestly, the fact that Lance wasn’t using his bayard and was instead trying to beat Keith with his fists, but Keith’s mind was preoccupied with raging anger and betrayal and his intense instincts that were telling him he had to win, no matter what it took.

 

“Lance, what the fuck are you doing?” Keith grunted, blocking Lance’s punches at his side and stomach. Lance didn’t answer, only let out an honestly terrifying growl and put more force behind his blows. 

 

Their struggle hadn’t carried on for very long before the others took notice, and there was a strange soft of silence as everyone tried to figure out what to do. Lance was snarling and baring his teeth and trying to claw at Keith’s face as he pushed them back and back and back, and Keith was gritting his teeth and trying his best not to hurt him as he fought to keep his balance. He didn’t know what was going on or why, but something was telling him to take a moment to stop and think things through. 

 

However, his train of thought was quickly shattered as the others began to shout at him.

 

“Don’t fucking hurt him!” Hunk yelled suddenly, sounding terrified, as if he thought Keith really would. 

 

“Try talking to him!” Pidge yelled next, audibly biting at her fingernails the way she did when she wasn’t able to predict the outcome of a certain situation.

 

“Don’t lose focus, Keith,” Shiro said, his voice considerably more calm but no less perplexed than Keith felt. “You can’t let him win.”

 

As helpful as his teammate’s words were, they weren’t. That didn’t help him, didn’t tell him anything he didn’t already know. Obviously there was something wrong with Lance and he didn’t seem to be in the mood for talking, and he wasn’t going to hurt him if he could avoid it. He just… didn’t know what to do instead. 

 

Keith didn’t know why his teammates were just standing there and watching like a bunch of idiots, didn’t know why it had to be  _ him  _ that Lance attacked, didn’t know why he always had to make all the hard decisions. He did, however, know that they still had a mission to complete and both him and Lance needed to make it out of this altercation unharmed, so he needed to do something and he needed to do it soon. 

 

“Drop your bayard!” Pidge yelled, making frantic hand gestures at Keith as Lance used his free hand to grab Keith’s hair and pull. Keith growled, resisting the temptation to beat Lance’s head in with the hilt of his sword. Keith debated his options for a bare second before he did as Pidge said and let his bayard clatter to the ground, using his newly freed hand to pry Lance’s hand from his hair and shove it behind his back. Lance struggled to grab Keith’s neck with his other hand, Keith’s grip on his wrist the only thing keeping him from succeeding as Lance brought one of his feet between Keith’s and attempted to knock him down.

 

“Widen your stance!” Shiro instructed as Lance tried again, almost managing to be successful and causing Keith to stumble back a step. Lance had never been particularly skilled at hand-to-hand, and Keith never thought he’d find himself genuinely struggling when engaged in combat with Lance. And yet, here he was, fighting his teammate and having to work hard to win.

 

His teammates’ advice was still less than helpful, because he could tussle with Lance all day long and still never be able to subdue him, and since Lance was taller and skinnier and had a higher center of gravity than Keith, it would be incredibly difficult for him to take him down. Especially if the other paladins were just going to stand there and watch.

 

So Keith went back to his original plan, and did his best to stay on his feet and hold onto Lance’s flailing hands as he thought through his options. Assuming hurting Lance was completely out of the question for more reasons than one, Keith was only left with a few solutions. He could either make a complete fool of himself and try to appeal to Lance’s subconscious and convince him that was he was still in there and he didn’t want this and this wasn’t him. Or, he could completely give up and hope that Lance would show him mercy. Or, finally, he could do something really, really  _ incredibly _ stupid. 

 

Keith wasn’t even really sure where the idea came from, and he was absolutely positive it was a bad one. But standing there, chest pressed against Lance’s as they both panted, feeling the sweat drip down his spine as his eyes roamed over Lance’s wild eyes and flushed cheeks, he really wanted to kiss him. And Keith’s only justification for the desire was that maybe the kiss would surprise Lance enough that he stopped fighting and Keith would be able to take him down that way. 

 

And since he failed to voice his plan out loud, there was no one to tell him no.

 

So Keith grit his teeth and ignored the almost manic smile stretched across Lance’s lips and kissed him, letting his eyes slip closed, a symbol that he trusted Lance even when he was being attacked by him. He felt Lance falter, felt his breath hitch in his throat as he stopped fighting and  hesitantly kissed Keith back, and Keith continued to kiss him even as he moved his limp hands behind him back and held them there, only letting go when he felt Shiro wrap his arms around Lance and pull him away. 

 

The three of them were looking at him, all with expressions that were along the lines of what Keith expected. Hunk was looking at him with a mix of awe and surprise, seemingly pleased that Keith had managed to avoid hurting him but shocked he’s gone to such lengths to do it. Pidge was looking a bit too smug for Keith’s liking, as if she knew the kiss hadn’t been entriely part of a plan to defeat Lance and had maybe stemmed from some repressed desire that Keith had been harboring for awhile. And Shiro just looked concerned, concerned for Lance who had gone back to struggling fruitlessly in his iron grip and concerned for Keith, although he could detect a hint of pride that Keith’s plan had worked. 

 

From that point on, the mission was a whirlwind of Shiro taking Lance back to the castle to be inspected by Coran and Allura as the remaining paladins finished the original mission, joining them back on the castleship once it was complete. 

 

Coran’s official diagnosis was that he didn’t know much, but the druids had injected him with something that had caused him to turn on his team. Keith figured that much was kind of obvious, but chose not to comment in an effort to avoid drawing attention to himself. The others let him go unquestioned, promising to let him know when Lance was out of the healing pod. 

 

The time it took Lance to heal was spent pacing, thinking, contemplating, tugging on his hair and groaning in frustration and fighting back tears. It was stupid. Absolutely ridiculous. No way in  _ hell _ had Keith caught feelings. No way in hell had Keith enjoyed that kiss, despite the circumstances. No way in hell did he  _ want to do it again.  _

 

He knew he was in denial, but he couldn’t help it. He’d spent his entire life up to that point believing love was a not-so-clever lie, believing he’d never be afflicted by it, and yet here he was. If he knew anything about anything, he had a romantic interest in Lance, and it was the worst fucking thing in the world. 

 

He wasn’t trying to say he was in love with Lance, but… maybe he was. That was the least of his worries, however, especially when Shiro poked his head into Keith’s room with a sympathetic smile and told Keith that Lance was out of the pod. 

 

The walk to the med bay for Keith was silent, as was the arrival, as was the entire time spent inside. Lance was apparently too busy catching up with the others to make eye contact with the person he’d attacked. He was apparently too tired to even spare Keith a glance, let alone speak to him about what had taken place between them. 

 

Keith was in an even worse mood when he returned to his room the second time, thinking that maybe if he was in love with Lance, he was going to regret it, just like he thought he would. 

 

Watching Lance over the next few days, though, Keith was quick to change his mind. Lance wasn’t his normal bubbly self, wasn’t flirting with the princess or poking fun at Pidge, wasn’t firing jokes at Hunk or making incessant noise around Shiro for the sole purpose of watching his eyebrow twitch. Lance wasn’t being… Lance. He was shutting himself in and shutting everyone out and watching it happen made Keith’s heart ache in a way it never had before. 

 

So after several days had passed and Lance stayed back from a mission because he “wasn’t feeling well”, Keith decided to say something. 

 

He walked to Lance’s room and tentatively knocked on the door, listening intently for any noise inside. “Um, Lance? It’s Keith.”

 

“What do you want?” Lance asked through the door, voice soft and lacking energy.           

 

“I just wanted to talk,” Keith told him.

 

“Talk about what?”

 

Keith sighed softly, resting his forehead against the door. “Please. Just let me in.”

 

There was shuffling that could be heard from behind the door before it was pulled open, revealing a disheveled Lance with dark bags under his eyes, his hair a mess as if he’d been running his fingers through it and his eyes puffy as if he’d been crying. Keith’s heart clenched in his chest at the sight, a soft noise almost escaping the back of his throat.   

 

“Come in, then,” Lance said, after Keith had stood there for several moments, staring at Lance and not moving. Keith flushed slightly, stepping past Lance as he moved into the room, taking note of how small Lance was trying to make himself as he stood there. 

 

Keith frowned as he walked over to sit on Lance’s bed, patting the space next to him. Now that he was here, it occurred to him that he didn’t really know what he was going to say. He and Lance had never really been the type to confide in one another, and it was horribly apparent now that he was being stared in the face with it. 

 

“Um, are you okay?” Keith began, biting his lip as Lance sat next to him, as far away as he could comfortably be. 

 

“Yes. Why wouldn’t I be?” Lance asked, voice sounding slightly defensive. 

 

“I don’t know. You’ve been… acting different, and I figured I’d come see why that was,” Keith said, resisting the urge to wrap his arms around himself for comfort. He’d never seen Lance so rigid and cold, so closed off and uninviting. He couldn’t help but feel like it’d been something he’d done, as well. 

 

“Well, I don’t know. Why did you kiss me?” Lance asked, turning to look at him with an icy glare. Keith was taken by surprise at the question, blinking a few times before he found the voice to answer. 

 

“I, uh… What?”

 

“Why. Did. You. Kiss. Me?” Lance practically hissed, his eyes narrowing. Keith continued to flounder for a second before he cleared his throat, cheeks for the flushing for the second time. 

 

“It was the only way to get you to snap out of it,” Keith said matter-of-factly. 

 

“It was  _ not, _ ” Lance scowled. 

 

“It was the only way that didn’t involve hurting you,” Keith said, furrowing his brow.

 

“What?” Lance asked, narrowing his eyes. “Think I’m too fragile to handle a little pain? Think I can’t take you in a fight? You could’ve taken me down another way. I would’ve preferred it.”

 

Keith was silent, confusion laced through his features. At the time, he hadn’t thought the kiss was going to be that big of a deal. In fact, he’d been looking back the past few days and thinking that he’d rather enjoyed it, and would even be interested in doing it again sometime. But… Lance clearly had not had the same train of thought.

 

Obviously, Keith should’ve thought about the consequences and how his actions would affect Lance, but he hadn’t, and now this was the result. 

 

“I don’t want to hurt you, Lance,” Keith settled on eventually, voice taking on a hardened edge. “I’m sorry for kissing you, okay? Maybe I should’ve done something else, but I was in a stressful situation and it seemed like a good idea at the time. I’m sorry I made you uncomfortable, but I don’t regret kissing you. Just that you obviously didn’t want me to.”

 

“Are you kidding?” Lance all but yelled, throwing his hands up. “Of  _ course  _ I wanted you to kiss me! But it’s not exactly the best thing in the world to have a crush on someone who has a vendetta against the entire concept of love.”

 

“I don’t—Wait. You have a crush on me?”

 

“Yes, you idiot. Thanks for noticing,” Lance spat, crossing his arms over his chest.

 

“Since when?” Keith asked, dumbfounded, heart fluttering at the idea that his admittedly muddy feelings might be returned. 

 

“Since  _ forever,  _ it feels like,” Lance said, sighing as his voice softened slightly and his shoulders slumped forward. “I was hoping I wouldn’t ever have to say it out loud. It’s super embarrassing. I’ve known how you feel about feelings since the day I met you, yet I was the stupid idiot that caught them anyway.”

 

“Lance…” Keith said, bringing a hand up to push through his hair as he took a deep breath. “I like you, too.” 

 

Lance immediately turned his head to scowl at him again, his eyes absolutely murderous. “Don’t say that to me because you pity me,” Lance said, sounding just as pissed off as he did disgusted. Keith shook his head rapidly, reaching out in a silent request for Lance’s hand.

 

“I’m not. I know I’m shit at feelings and I know what I thought about them before, but… things are different now. I’m not the same person I was when we first came out here. I’ve gone through a lot and learned a lot and changed even more, and now my opinions are a little different than they used to be. Mostly because I like you. I like you a lot.”

 

Lance stared at him for a long time, eyes flicking over the features of Keith’s face that were pouring out as much honesty and sincerity as he could muster. He wasn’t lying, meant his words as much as he’d ever meant anything. His head was still kind of fuzzy but he knew what he felt and he knew what this feeling was, and he didn’t want to waste his time not acting on it. Especially if Lance felt the same way. 

 

“Promise you’re not just pulling my leg or pitying me or something?” Lance asked eventually, eyes still slightly narrowed. 

  
  


“Promise,” Keith said, holding out his pinky to Lance, crossing the empty space on the bed between them. Lance tentatively wrapped his pinky around Keith’s, looking up to make eye contact with Keith as he did. Keith smiled at him and pulled Lance closer by his grip on his pinky, bringing his other hand up to cup Lance’s face. “Can I kiss you again?”

 

“Yeah,” Lance said, smiling softly as he let his eyes drift shut, leaning closer until his lips brushed against Keith’s. “I think that would be okay.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> comments/kudos much appreciated <3


End file.
